House Hunting
by sanctum-c
Summary: Finding a decent place to live in Midgar is not easy. Every house is either far too expensive, or a run down shack only still there because the slums don't get rained on. Elmyra Gainsborough is fed up with looking and while exploring Sector Six hits on an unusual solution to the problem.


_This resulted from a post servantofsadako made on tumblr with some additional comments from ariescelestial. This is also idea one of two for concept... _

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><p>Before coming to Midgar, Elmyra Gainsborough thought her savings would allow her to get a nice place to live in the city. While living on the upper plate was a dream beyond plausibility at present, it did not mean it could not be a goal to work towards. It soon became clear that living in the slums was not cheap either. More so if she wanted an actual home and not a crumbling apartment in one of the many blocks that rose up to just below the plate. The only affordable houses were shanty-town constructions, made permanent by the lack of weather. It was nothing like the place Elmyra imagined herself living in. The kind of place where someone might be able to start a family. She smiled when shown one and declined to proceed any further in as polite a tone as she could. Afterwards she would wander back to her temporary home, hoping there was somewhere she could afford to live well.<p>

After work Elmyra trawled Sector Five and the areas around it, looking for a home. Sector Six was not even up for consideration. Most of the Sector was junk and ruins; the only habitable area was Wall Market. Living there was not an option she even considered. Elmyra might have paid more attention to Sector Four if it would not make it harder to see the friends she had made since moving to Midgar. Staying in Sector Five was preferable and it was not as if the other sectors were cheaper from what she saw in property guides and adverts. She hoarded the pittance she had left over each month but it never amounted to anything close to enough.

Elmyra lived out of boxes in a limbo state; never quite packed and ready to move, but also never settling in. Some rooms were close to unpacked, but they were out-numbered by the box rooms. S she had intended to stay for a good while but her landlord mentioned his intent to sell the apartment the day before she moved in. The choice; live here, knowing it was more temporary than desired or try to convince her former landlord to let her stay. Easy choice; the former house had been cold, damp and moldering. Remaining ready to leave as soon as it was necessary became normal fast. Elmyra made do with the mass of boxes around her, rummaging through them only when an item was too important to live without.

After working all day and coming home tired, she wanted to do something else - anything else. But not only did she need somewhere better to live, she also needed a better paying job. The search for both ate into her evenings, her time to unwind and it felt like something pulling her in every direction at once. After a month of stress, Elmyra conceded temporary defeat and refused to search for either jobs or housing for a week. She began wandering Sector Five after work. There was an abandoned church near the outskirts of the sector and she peered inside wondering how it had survived all this time. She took brief trips into Sector Four and, with staff in hand, into Sector Six. There were monsters here, though for the most part they clung to the shadows, not eager to venture out into the light. Elmyra had yet to encounter anything she could not handle, but there were always whispers of larger horrors at night. If everything was equal Elmyra would not set foot here if she could avoid it. But Sector Six was so different to many of the other sectors. The plate overhead was incomplete and the jagged, vacant middle let what little light there was in the region reach the ground. It was the only place one could feel the rain on their skin; outside of the gaps between the plates, this felt the closest to the world outside.

On her current wander the sky was grey and overcast. Rain was possible too, but at least she was not far into the Sector. Getting out of a rain-storm would be easy. She gripped her staff a little tighter as she clambered over abandoned construction equipment. What had this place been like before the city grew around it? A crash behind her made her whirl around, her staff at the ready. Elmyra blinked. A picturesque house stood in front of her. She frowned. Where had it come from? A growl sounded from nearby. Elmyra stared around, trying to catch sight of the offending monster. The growl sounded again and she frowned, turning back to the house. It had come from inside the house. She took a step backwards, not moving her eyes from the two-story edifice in front of her. The growl sounded again, and the house changed. The nearest wall split open, a skeletal head emerging to stare at her with empty eye sockets. The building shook as it rose up onto squat legs, three arms bursting from sections of the house.

The creature took a ponderous step towards her as Elmyra backed away. At least it seemed slow moving. Better to retreat than antagonize the monster and chance anything else coming after her. Elmyra took a few steps back, keeping an eye on the house as it moved forward. That it was not charging her did not mean anything, but it seemed incapable of moving any faster. She span on her heel and raced for the gate to Sector Five. The house roared in frustration behind her, but the sounds of its movement and cries soon faded into the distance. She sagged once across the border of her home sector and took a moment to breath hard. No one had ever mentioned a monster like that before. Elmyra frowned. She had been staring at what looked like a nice house. Two stories high, pretty spacious - assuming the interior was not taken up by the creature. Was it possible to kill the monster and use its remains? Despite the skeleton head and limbs, it had looked as though the walls were wood and the roof tiled. Elmyra wondered how such a creature had come to exist. There were many weird things found in the darker corners of the slums, but something like that?

She shook her head. Not a sensible thought. But hard to ignore now it had taken root in her mind. Get the creature somewhere livable, try to dispatch it and then make use of the shell as a home. No guarantee it would work, but it would not hurt to try. Well, outside of luring a hostile organism from the desolate Sector Six into the populated Sector Five. And risk her own safety in the venture. But it was either this or back to house listings. This sounded more appealing. So where would she like her new house to be? Elmyra stared towards Sector Four. There was a secluded area in that direction, down by the river. It was a large area of unused land - messy at the moment but easy enough to clean up. Elmyra imagined the route she would need to take to get the house over there. The streets all seemed wide enough, but there were just too many people. She smiled. While Midgar may never sleep, it was impossible to ignore there were far fewer people on the streets in the night-time.

For now though; rest. Elmyra wandered home, replaying the encounter in her head, and running through the route she would take. Night-fall was hours away and sleep proved impossible as she awaited the quieter streets. She stared at the ceiling as she waited for the hours to pass, hoping to feel tired. Sleep never overtook her and she set out earlier than planned. Night-time was still strange in this city, the streets more or less as well lit as day-time. Only the distant view of the edge of the city offered a hint of the current time in the outside world. At least there were fewer people around now. Elmyra paused on the edge of Sector Six, remembering whispers and rumors of how bad the Sector could be at night. Shaking her head, she shifted her grip on her staff and strode forward. It did not tale long to reach the place she encountered the monster. While it was disappointing, Elmyra was not surprised to find it gone. As long as it had not moved too far. She scanned the area. It should be easy to spot the monster given it's scale and somewhat unusual look. Nothing so far. Maybe this was not a good plan. Maybe it would be best to just go home and return to routine. Maybe-. A now familiar crash distracted her, her heart leaping as she spun around. The picturesque house was right in front of her again.

She darted forward as it exuded it's skeletal extremities, her staff cracking down onto it's skull. "Come and get me," she taunted as she skipped backwards, on moving a few steps away. Elmyra lured it with careful timing, darting in to smack a limb, or the head as she drew the creature out of Sector Six. Scattered, panicked shouts and screams sounded around her as she arrived in Sector Five. No one was certain what to do as she danced around and attacked the house. It's movements became slower as it lumbered after her. Her arms were aching, her palms stinging as she hit the monster with harder blows to stop it becoming distracted with anyone else. The slower pace might mean it was in pain, or exhausted. It might even be dying. Could she kill it? Elmyra did not allow herself the luxury of failure. She was going to do this. But there was still so much further to go, and it was taking so long.

The house was doddering as they approached the river, and a small crowed observed from a safe distance. Elmyra was breathing hard, but exhilarated. She darted forward and brought her staff down hard on the head again. This time it dropped and hung limp as the house halted and thudded to the ground. The skeletal arms hung limp from the windows and the legs were no longer visible. Elmyra let herself fall back to the dirt, staring up at the immobile structure. Someone in the crowd started applauding, scattered other observers joining in. Soon the whole crowd was cheering her. Elmyra allowed herself a smirk before getting to her feet and investigated the remains.

She held her staff ready as she approached, still not convinced the creature was dead. At least it did not react as she drew closer, but it still might save a final burst of strength to attack when she was nearby. There was a door near the base. Locked? No. It swung open at her touch, and trying not to think of jumping into the belly of a beast, Elmyra stepped inside. It was not quite what she might have expected. The interior did not seem like that of a monster; the floor was stone, the walls wood. A set of stairs lead upwards and there was no trace of the creature visible here.

So far, so good. But now was not the time to get over-confident and lose everything after such an achievement. Elmyra tip-toed up the stairs. A skeletal spin ran from one wall of the house to the other, out towards where the head was. It branched high in the rafters to connect to joints and bones terminating in the arms hanging from the windows. She squinted, peering upwards at what looked to be a missile launcher, wired in among the bones. An odd part of the whole. At least the creature had never used used against her. Was it more weird than a sentient house that had tried to attack her and which she had lured here? Elmyra smiled at the question. The spine ran through the wood above her, but it did not look like it would be impossible to extract. And even if it was not; Elmyra could live with a monster spine in the roof - if she had this house. She stared around the wide landing, imagining what the house would look like when occupied.

What to do first? Well, after she removed the limbs, the skull, repaired the holes in the roof; what then? Put in windows, she realized with a start. And that would be expensive. But it was doable. It was plausible. She had the shell here, a place to start from. Elmyra would spend all that money she spent on rent improving and modifying this house. This was her home now. Elmyra smiled, making a mental list of everything she needed to get and do. How soon she could retrieve her things, how quick she could break her contract. First things first; she needed a locksmith for the front door.

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><p><em><strong>AN**: I randomly decided that Elmyra's name did not change when she got married._


End file.
